“If we’re going to move to this town, I’ll need to learn how to say it!” I said to Michael. 

Somehow, he already had it down. 

But after three days, “Villaviciosa” didn’t exactly roll off my tongue. 

I was, however, optimistic. After all, I could now easily talk about getting our empadronamientos at the Ayuntamiento.

So why was Villaviciosa such a hard word to pronounce? Probably because it includes so many of the features that make Spanish pronunciation so interesting or frustrating, depending on your outlook: 

• V’s are pronounced like B’s. Which, my Spanish language partner tells me, is why many Spaniards, even as adults, get spellings of such words incorrect. 
• “LL” is pronounced like the “Y” in “yellow.”
• In Spain, the letter “C” is pronounced like the English “TH” (as in the word thumb). 
• “I” is pronounced like the English long “E.”

Got all that?

Thankfully, I learned Spanish pronunciation in a natural way, so never had to memorize any of the above rules. If I see a word written, I can pronounce it.

And that was the problem. I hadn’t spent enough time studying the spelling of Villaviciosa. So I took a few minutes to do so.

By the end of our trip, we decided to make Villaviciosa our next home town. And by the end of our trip, I was able to successfully tell people where we were headed. 

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For those of you still mystified:

• Villaviciosa is pronounced: Bee – yuh- beeth – ee -O-suh—accent on the “o”
• Ayuntamiento is pronounced: eye – yoon- ta- me -EN-toe. This is the word for city hall.
• Empadronamiento is pronounced: em- pah- drone- ah – me – EN – toe. This is a paper that you apply for at the Ayuntamiento that registers you as a resident of the town. Luckily, in the beginning, I could get away with saying the nickname many Spaniards use for this word: Padrón (pah-DRONE)